[title page.]

CAP’N SIMON WHEELER,

THE AMATEUR DETECTIVE.

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A LIGHT TRAGEDY,

by

MARK TWAIN (SAMUEL L. CLEMENS).

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PERSONS REPRESENTED

Cap’n Simon Wheeler; Mr. Horace Griswold; Hugh Burnside (a poet); Chas. Dexter (his cousin); Detective Baxter, Detective Billings, Detective Bullet (these three being professionals from New York); Jake Belford (a fugitive desperado); Tom Hooker (a newspaper reporter); Lem Sackett (a telegraph operator); Jake Long (a police officer); A Newsboy; A Magistrate; Miss Clara Burnside; Miss Millicent Griswold; Mrs. James Burnside; Mrs. Matilda Griswold; Mrs. Jenny Wheeler (wife of the Cap’n); Mrs. Higgins (a garrulous, good-natured widow).

The scene is laid in an obscure mountain village, supposed to be three or four hundred miles from New York.

PLOT AND INCIDENTS.

Summer twilight promenade of citizens; Cap’n Wheeler concealed, taking observations. Charles and Hugh pretend to quarrel, in order to fool him—exit. Enter Mr. and Mrs. Griswold: “The Uncle’s will will leave everything to Charley; our Millicent shall refuse Hugh.”—Exit. Enter Hugh and Millicent.—She refuses him; the sap-head resolves to commit suicide.—Exit. Enter the elder Griswolds and Mrs. Higgins.—The latter has discovered that the will gives the property to Hugh, not Charley.—Exit. Enter Charley and Clara, and pour a libation (of ink) to their betrothal. Will give the news to her brother Hugh, as a birth-day present, in the morning.—Exit. Enter Tom and Lem (bosom friends).—Both been refused, the night before, by Clara; they fight, and tumble on the Cap’n, who tries to capture them, but they assist each other and escape. Tableau.

Scene 2.—Open place in a wood, moonlight, midnight.

Enter Hugh, poisoned; apparently falls dead. Enter Cap’n, on his track; sits down on him to study out the best way of hunting for him; rises and continues forming plan; thinks he is on the right track now, starts off, stumbles over the body, but hurries on, not observing what it is.—Exit. Enter Tom, tight, discovers body—a good item; sits down on it to smoke and glorify his good fortune; drags the body home, to keep rival journal from getting the item. Enter Mrs. Higgins, Mrs. Burnside, and others, seeking the missing youth; find his hat.—Exit in grief. Enter Tom and Lem, with the body, and conceal it in a thicket; have fought in their room and bloodied it; fear they will be hanged for murder; they swear to be mute, and stand by each other henceforth, to the gallows.—Exit. Day dawns.—Enter Hugh, from thicket; glad he did not take enough poison; fears ridicule; resolves to mysteriously disappear. Hand-organ heard. Enter fugitive desperado, Jake Belford, disguised as a tramp; Hugh buys an exchange of clothes, &c., for cash.—Exit, to make the exchange. Enter Cap’n Wheeler, his wife following, knitting (as usual). The Cap’n’s marvelous theory of the disappearance, which compels simple Jenny’s worshipful admiration; the murder must have been done by a left handed man, because “most of the murders in detective stories are done by left-handed people;” Cap’n sees a man in the distance, scratching his head with his left hand.—Exit, excitedly, followed by his wife. Enter Charley, with gun and game, on track of a wolf; fires into the thicket and “gets” the newly disguised desperado, who falls dead on his face.—Exit Charley, and covers the body; thinks it Hugh. Enter Millicent, sorry she obeyed her father and discarded Hugh. Enter Newsboy, and sells her an extra, “All about the mysterious disappearance, etc., etc.”—Exit the boy. Enter Charley, in a panicky state of mind; the distressed Milly shows him the extra, which pretty nearly “fetches” him.—They exit, arm in arm, he keeping his secret, but trying to encourage and comfort her. Enter Hugh, as a tramp, and sees them disappearing in this very friendly conjunction. Enter Cap’n, whose man was right-handed, after all; is overjoyed to see the tramp shake his stick, left-handed, at some invisible object (the retreating couple); questions the tramp in an absurd way, after the supposed manner of professional detectives; thinks the answers show guilt; wants to haunt this tramp till he is sure; tramp contracts to saw a white pine stick in two, three times, for hot meals and a napkin—requires three weeks to “do it right” in; must be conveyed in a hack; the Cap’n takes him home on his back.

Scene—Outskirts of the village—some cottages.

Several Weeks Later.—The three detectives and Cap’n cross the stage one after the other, making idiotic gestures signifying that each is hot upon the murderer’s track. Cap’n is disguised as a sailor of about Columbus’s time. Cap’n returns. Feels pretty sure of the tramp’s guilt, but thinks best to throw out a random feeler here and there on other people, so as to make certain. One at a time Charley, Lem and Tom pass by, having heard wild, undefined rumors of something going on “up yonder.” Cap’n tackles each in turn and frightens him to death by slipping up behind him and suddenly shouting in his ear, “You done it!” He ponders over the results and decides that these are not murderers, because their fright was too “ghastly and sudden and natural.” Tom the reporter informs him that detective Baxter’s theory is that Hugh’s mother killed Hugh, with a broad-axe; Billings’s is that Hugh’s sister killed him, with a stove-lid; Bullet’s is that Millicent brained him, with a hymn book. Cap’n declines to give Tom his own marvelous theory (a new one) yet a-while, but reveals it to Jenny—has no secrets from her. Enter all the characters, with news that the body is found! Dismal joy of Hugh the pretended tramp, over the grief, and praise of himself, and general public suffering which the discovery of his decayed remains elicits. Fright of Charles, Tom and Lem; each considers himself secretly hunted, and infallibly doomed. The three New York detectives see signs of guilt in the grief of the three women; the Cap’n sees the same evidences in the moist but cheerful demeanor of Hugh the tramp. Clara despises her affianced, Charles, because he avoids her, in her trouble, and never encouraged her with a hope, while all others did. The elder Griswolds suspect Charley, because of the sham quarrel, (a little of which they overheard,) and because the death of Hugh makes the property revert to Charley; they do not conceal their suspicions from him, but do from all others. Hugh the tramp plays deaf and dumb on everybody but “detective” Cap’n Wheeler; he is not afraid of his recognizing his voice, although Wheeler has known him all his life. Charles, who knows the sign-language of mutes, tries to ask some questions, at Milly’s request, but is “stumped” by Hugh’s intricate and marvelous signs in reply, Hugh’s system of signs being an entirely fresh and original one. Officer Long comes shamelessly to collect the reward for finding Hugh’s body, and is ejected and advised to wait a decent time, by the Cap’n. Tom and Lem end their terrors with their customary fight—exit all, but Cap’n. Re-enter Long to see about the row. Enter newsboy with extra about finding body; Long arrests him for yelling too loudly; clubs him for not resisting (because “city cops do it”); boy forcibly released by the Cap’n, “by the authority vested in every man that is a man, to protect a weakling when he’s in trouble.” Enter detective Baxter; tries to get information out of the apochryphal sailor, who defeats him by replying in the Choctaw language. Exit Baxter. Enter detective Billings on the same errand; the Cap’n pretends idiotcy. Exit Billings, defeated. Enter detective Bullet on the same errand; the Cap’n pretends to be stone deaf—exit Bullet, defeated. Exit Cap’n, to spy further on the tramp. Night. Enter Tom and Lem with a plan to scare the dreaded Cap’n out of the camp, (by blowing up his cottage,) and thus stop him from (as they imagine) haunting their guilty track. They put a keg of powder against his cottage (not knowing that he moved out of it the night before). They first ascertain that no one is in the house; they light two slow-matches and stick them into opposite sides of the keg; “one might go out”; they quarrel, and exit fighting. Enter the Cap’n and sits down on the keg to ruminate; smells something burning; presently discovers one slow-match; removes it, delighted to think he has outwitted the tramp’s deadly designs upon him; holds it up—“Now stink at your leisure.” Lights his pipe with it and throws it down. Lem and Tom appear, and cannot muster voice enough, in their terror, to warn the Cap’n to get off the keg before the other slow-match sends him to heaven. They conclude to retire to the rear and dislodge him with a stone. Slow-match sizzling viciously, the Cap’n calmly mapping out new plans against the tramp—curtain slowly descends. Prodigious explosion. Curtain rises, displaying the wrecked cottage; Cap’n, powder-blackened, sitting on the ground at a distance, rubbing the back of his head: “Lucky that stone made me skip out of that when it did, or we’d ’a’ been a detective short.”

Scene—A part of the Public Square.

Next Day.—People straggling to the funeral. Baxter crosses stage with armful of broad-axes (collected in his search for the right one); presently, Billings with pile of stove-lids; after him Bullet with stack of hymn-books. Charley and Millicent talking; Tramp jealous and distressed; presently he overhears her say she “adores his memory.” Tramp faints for joy; Billings stumbles over him and spills his stove-lids. Conversation; then exit all, to the funeral, the joyous tramp following, grinding hand-organ briskly in contrast with the solemn tolling of the bell. Enter Cap’n, disguised as a negro, his wife at his heels. Cap’n shows her how a professional detective goes through a “theory” in dumb show when said detective knows people are looking at him, (though he pretends he doesn’t). Unfolds to the admiring Jenny his wonderful new theory. Exit Jenny; enter tramp, overcome by the affecting nature of his own funeral sermon, and the laudations his doggerel received in it. Sees through the Cap’n’s disguise (as usual); perceives that the Cap’n suspects him of being the murderer (of himself); resolves to help him in his investigations. Takes a nap, and confesses the murder in his sleep. Cap’n disguises himself on the spot as an Irishwoman, overlaying his black complexion with flour or chalk, and purposes inveigling tramp into repeating the confession awake. The tramp wakes; is charged with confessing in his sleep; tramp cares nothing for that. Cap’n boldly pours his absurd “theory” into tramp’s ear; tramp pretends it is correct in every detail; in despair he confesses again. Cap’n is distressed, now, to think he has trapped the hunted victim to his death by lies and treachery; suddenly offers him money, tells him to fly, shoves him along. Tramp refuses to go; says it is useless, his doom is sure. “Do you know who I am? I am Jack Belford, the fugitive desperado!” (Amazement of the Cap’n). It is agreed that the tramp shall stay around within sound of a whistle till the time comes when the arrest will be most theatrical and make the biggest “situation”; the Cap’n will then give the signal, make the arrest, and pocket both of the thousand-dollar rewards—one for finding the body of the “late” Hugh Burnside, and the other for the capture of Jack Belford “dead or alive.” Bell tolls.—Enter funeral procession with coffin covered with flowers. Much grief, much glorification of the “late” poet. Tramp, in tears of melancholy enjoyment: “I wish I could attend my funeral every day of my life.” Exit procession, bell tolling, tramp grinding his hand-organ, the Cap’n closing procession at his heels, bawling inconsolably. “He was always good to .me, poor young chap.” Enter Detective Baxter, with a broad-axe; going to suddenly thrust it before Mrs. Burnside, at the grave, and if the guilty creature “but winces,” arrest her on the spot; exit. Enter Billings with stove-lid—going to convict Clara at the grave; exit. Enter Bullet, with “Plymouth Collection;” going to confront Millicent with this “dismal instrument of torture and destruction” at the grave-side. Exit.

Magistrate’s Office.—Enter Officer Long; has just met one of the New York detectives, who said he would have the assassin of Hugh Burnside under arrest in five minutes. Turmoil outside. Enter excited crowd. Enter Baxter with Mrs. Burnside and the fatal broad-axe; he charges her. Tom: “It’s a lie! if murder’s been done, put it on me, where it belongs!” Cap’n (aside), “O this is a d—d swindle!” (Gives peculiar whistle—but the tramp does not come.) Enter Billings, with Millicent and the deadly hymn book: “Way for the red-handed murderess!” He charges her. Lem: “No! I’m the only guilty one! (pleadingly), and do please string me up quick and get me out of it—I can’t stand the suspense!” Cap’n (aside—plaintively), “O these mean underhanded liars ’ll just ruin me!” (Whistles—but tramp doesn’t come). Enter Bullet, with Clara and the fearful stove-lid: “Way for the crimson assassin!” He charges her. Enter Charles, and raises his hand to command silence: “I am the murderer!” Cap’n (aside—plaintively), “Consound the luck; have I got to divide the honors among seven?” (Whistles; no result: “Dern that tramp!”) Clara (to Charles), “O say it was by accident, and I will bless you all my days!” Charles: “It was by accident, wholly.” Hand-organ heard; enter the tramp; Cap’n collars him joyously: “Stand back, frauds, the lot of ye! Here’s the only true and genuine assassin of the poet Burnside! here he is—the original Jacobs! And his confession annuls all the others—by priority, seniority, first mortgage!—for he confessed more’n an hour ago! Don’t you be afeared, Trampy; you stand your ground—I’m a backin’ you agin the field!—I, detective Simon Wheeler! (Stripping off Irishwoman’s disguise); and who do you reckon he is? Stand by for a surge—it’s the bloody desperado Jack Belford in disguise! He killed him, Judge; he played that pison old tune to him till he’d got him weak and helpless, and then he up and batted him over the head with his deadly hand-organ!” Hugh the tramp: “Alas, I am the only guilty one!” (Strips off disguise). General explosion of joy and indiscriminate embracing. Cap’n (aside, plaintively): “It’s all a fraud—and away goes all them rewards.” Jenny tries to comfort him.

Cap’n: “Tain’t no use, Jenny; it’s another failure—and the boss failure of the old man’s life, too.” Mrs. Burnside: “Who talks of failure? It’s the grandest success man ever achieved! You’ve given me back my dead son alive—take the reward!” Hugh contributes hand-organ and tramp’s disguise: “They’re invaluable to a detective, old Chum!” Charles: “I accidently killed the desperado Belford; thousand dollars offered for him, dead or alive—take it, old man!” Clara: “O you dear old dear, if I only had something to give you!” (Suddenly tip-toes and kisses him.) Cap’n: A“That’s worth all the trouble I’ve been at!” Millicent: “Bless your old heart!” (Suddenly kisses him a couple of times.) Cap’n: “I’m richly rewarded!” The ancient widow Higgins, passing a wipe of her apron across her mouth: “Throw prejudice aside for this once!” (Suddenly gives him three sounding smacks, before he can struggle loose.) Cap’n: “I’m more than rewarded! Well, take it all round, Jenny, it ain’t a failure; to track out a murderer ain’t much, but to track out a mislaid corpse, and fetch him home alive and good as new, takes genius! Fall in! fall in! we’ll take the boy home and have a tearing jubilee! Mark time—forward march!” They file away, the Cap’n closing the rear, grinding stirring music from the hand-organ.

Curtain.

MUSIC AND THE DRAMA.

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The Fifth Avenue Theatre.

The names of Mark Twain and Bret Harte, the joint authors of the new play of “Ah Sin,” attracted a very large audience to the Fifth Avenue Theatre last night, and it may be said at once that the representation of the latest addition to the list of so-called American plays was received with many demonstrations of popular approval. This result was due partly, to the handsome scenery provided by the management and the general smoothness of the performance, but chiefly to the clever assumption of the title character by Mr. Parsloe. The play itself is not remarkable either as a literary work—although it contains many bits of clever and characteristic dialogue—or as a dramatic composition. Neither Mr. Harte, who has given us a taste of his ability before in that unhappy production, “The Two Men of Sandy Bar,” nor Mr. Twain seems to be skilful at patchwork, but “Ah Sin” has at least the merit of introducing the New York public to a new kind of dramatic hero, and of containing one or two clever and original dramatic surprizes. The principal character in the play is of course “Ah Sin,” but that bland heathen has very little connection with the story until the last act, when his thieving propensities enable him to produce startling and incontrovertible evidence in behalf of the maligned and persecuted hero, a “gentleman miner,” Mr. Yorke, who is about to be hanged by a vigilance committee for the murder of Billy Plunket, known as “the champion liar of Calaveras.” It may be remarked here incidentally that lying is the strong point of nearly all the characters of the play. Ah Sin lies because it is his nature to, Uncle Billy lies because he thinks that romance is more interesting than truth, and all the female characters deny their personal identities and tell lies (although it is perhaps scarcely polite to call the guileless prevarications of ladies by so offensive a name) for the general mystification of the male performers and their own peculiar delectation. After this brief digression it is only necessary to assure the reader that the “champion liar” is not murdered after all, proving himself as untrustworthy in this respect as in others, but returns to the scenes of his imaginative career just in time to confound the heavy villain in the moment of his triumph, to rescue the innocent and persecuted Yorke, and to be himself restored to the arms of a wife from whom he had fled as a pestilence years before.

The story, in short, is the old one which has done duty in numberless melodramas, but derives a certain freshness from the comparative novelty of its surroundings. The rough scenes of camp life in the Far West are graphically and firmly sketched, and several of the characters might easily be studies from the life. We have the word of Mr. Clemens himself that the representation of the Chinaman by Mr. Parsloe is as nearly perfect as possible, and few persons who witnessed the performance last night will be inclined to doubt the truth of the assertion. In form and gait and feature the actor is to all intents and purposes as genuine a Chinaman as any Mongolian on the Pacific coast. He has caught and reproduces with marvellous accuracy the tricks of speech and manner, the imperturbability of visage, the vacant eye, with its momentary flashes of keen intelligence, and all the other attributes of the original Ah Sin. Whether thieving, lying, drinking or sleeping, defying a vigilance committee or laying a table cloth he is a Chinaman to the marrow, and the merriment never flags for an instant while he is upon the stage.

The Billy Plunkett of Mr. P. A. Anderson is a strong and finished impersonation, but the old man’s stories are spun out to too great a length. There is a very strong scene between Plunkett and the villain Broderick in the first act, in which both Mr. Anderson and Mr. Collier act uncommonly well. Mr. Crisp as the virtuous Yorke lacks color, but this is partly the fault of the authors, who have conspired to make him uninteresting. Mr. Davidge, Mr. Varrey and Mr. Vining Bowers are most efficient representatives of members of a vigilance committee, and contributed greatly to the success of the final scene, a trial by jury in the court of Judge Lynch. This is a cleverly-drawn sketch, and with a little condensation will be very effective. It was admirably acted last night. The female characters are rather uninteresting, but Miss Goldthwaite acted prettily as the heroine, and Mrs. Gilbert was very amusing as a vulgar old woman of the Malaprop order, who is the wife of Plunkett, and Miss Blande, a new comer, acted very truthfully the part of a coarse and ignorant girl. The general effect of the performance was satisfactory, notwithstanding the inherent defects of the play. What Mr. Clemens thinks of it may be learned from the following capital speech which he made in response to a call before the curtain:

“Ladies and Gentlemen: In view of this admirable success, it is meet that I try to express to you our hearty thanks for the large share which your encouraging applause has had in producing this success. This office I take upon me with great pleasure. This is a very remarkable play. You may not have noticed it, but I assure you it is so. The construction of this play was a work of great labor and research, also of genius and invention—and plagiarism. When the authors of this play began their work they were resolved that it should not lack blood-curdling disasters, accidents, calamities—for these things always help out a play. But we wanted them to be new ones, brilliant, unhackneyed. In a lucky moment we hit upon the breaking down of a stage-coach as being something perfectly fresh and appalling. It seemed a stroke of genius—an inspiration. We were charmed with it. So we naturally overdid it a little. Consequently, when the play was first completed we found we had had that stage break down seven times in the first act. We saw that that wouldn’t do—the piece was going to be too stagey (I didn’t notice that—that is very good). Yes, the critics and everyone would say this sort of thing argued poverty of invention. And (confidentially) it did resemble that. So, of course, we set to work and put some limitations upon that accident, and we threw a little variety into the general style of it, too. Originally the stage coach always came in about every seven minutes and broke down at the footlights and spilt the passengers down among the musicians. You can see how monotonous that was—to the musicians. But we fixed all that. At present the stage coach only breaks down once; a private carriage breaks down once, and the horses of another carriage run away once. We could have left out one or two of these, but then we had the horses and vehicles on our hands, and we couldn’t afford to throw them away on a mere quibble. I am making this explanation in the hope that it will reconcile you to the repetition of that accident.

“This play is more didactic than otherwise. For the instruction of the young we have introduced a game of poker in the first act. The game of poker is all too little understood in the higher circles of this country. Here and there you find an ambassador that has some idea of the game, but you take the general average of the nation and our ignorance ought to make us blush. Why I have even known a clergyman—a liberal, cultivated, estimable, pure-hearted man and most excellent husband and father—who didn’t value an ace full above two pair and a jack. Such ignorance as this is brutalizing. Whoever sees Mr. Parsloe in this piece sees as good and natural and consistent a Chinaman as he could see in San Francisco. I think his portrayal of the character reaches perfection. The whole purpose of the piece is to afford an opportunity for the illustration of this character. The Chinaman is going to become a very frequent spectacle all over America by and by, and a difficult political problem, too. Therefore it seems well enough to let the public study him a little on the stage beforehand. The actors, the management and the authors have done their best to begin this course of public instruction effectually this evening. I will say only one word more about this remarkable play. It is this: When this play was originally completed it was so long and so wide and so deep (in places) and so comprehensive that it would have taken two weeks to play it. And I thought this was a good feature. I supposed we could have a sign on the curtain, “To be continued,” and it would be all right; but the manager said no, that wouldn’t do; to play a play two weeks long would be sure to get us into trouble with the government, because the Constitution of the United States says you sha’n’t inflict cruel and unusual punishments. So he set to work to cut it down and cart the refuse to the paper-mill. Now that was a good thing. I never saw a play improve as this one did. The more he cut out of it the better it got right along. He cut out, and cut out, and cut out; and I do believe this would be one of the best plays in the world to-day if his strength had held out, and he could have gone on and cut out the rest of it. With this brief but necessary explanation of the plot and purpose and moral of this excellent work, I make my bow, repeat my thanks, and remark that the scissors have been repaired and the work of improvement will still go on.”